Salt of the Earth: Social Justice News April 2000

Social justice news
April 2000

U.S. about-face on children soldiers
Will embassy bomber face a federal death wattant?
Clinton/NRA gunfight at the not-OK corral
Is homelessness back to haunt us?
Volunteer boom leads to bust
Minimum wage increase stalled by tax cut proposal
The tax man cometh!

Is homelessness back to haunt us?
Two recent surveys indicate a worsening homeless situation and a greater strain on services to the homeless.

Based on of the 1996 federal National Survey of Homeless Assistance Providers and Clients, The Urban Institute, a Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit and nonpartisan social issues research organization, estimates between 2.3 and 3.5 million Americans—nearly 1 percent of the United States population—will likely experience homelessness at least once during a year. This number includes 900,000 to 1.35 million children. If their population analysis is restricted just to people living in poverty, the percentage rises to 6.3 to 9.6 percent, including 6.2 to 9.3 percent of children in poverty. The analysis also shows a near doubling of homeless people in February in comparison with October, indicating a high seasonal variation in homelessness.

Growth in services to the homeless has mirrored the rising number of homeless people. From 1988 to 1996, the nation's shelter and housing capacity grew from 275,000 to almost 608,000 beds, an increase largely accountable to new funding for transitional and permanent housing for the homeless. In the same time period, the number of these housing units grew from near zero to about 274,000.

The decade also saw an increase in meals served to the homeless in central cities from 97,000 to 382,100 on an average day; in 1996 the total number of meals served to the homeless was about 570,000. Other types of homeless services, such as health services, outreach programs, and drop-in centers, also increased.

For more information:

US Mayor's survey in PDF format

Summary of findings froms the Urban Institute

During 1998 the U.S. Conference of Mayors surveyed 30 major city governments on hunger and homelessness. In terms of homelessness, the survey found requests for emergency shelter grew by an average of 11 percent, with 72 percent of cities showing an increase. Of these requests, about 26 percent went unmet; 67 percent of cities report having to turn people away from shelters due to lack of resources.

Among the causes for the increase in emergency services cited by city officials, lack of affordable housing headed the list. Other causes include substance abuse and lack of services for the approximately 38 percent of homeless who are substance abusers; mental illness—an estimated 24 percent of homeless people are mentally ill—and lack of mental health services; low-paying jobs despite a strong economy; domestic violence; changes in public assistance, especially welfare reform and the elimination of Section 8 incremental certificates; general poverty; and lack of access to affordable health care (eight percent of the homeless have AIDS or an HIV-related illness).—Joel Schorn

Volunteer boom leads to bust
While the number of Catholic college graduate volunteers is increasing, several Catholic volunteer programs have to scale back their efforts. Why this seemingly illogical connection?

In the last year, the total number of volunteers in these programs has risen from a little more than 5,000 to 6,600. Short-term volunteering programs enjoyed the largest gains in sheer numbers, although volunteer agencies reported that the number of volunteers in programs of a year or more also enjoyed some gains—rising to 1,750 from 1,650.

For information about volunteeting:

Claretian volunteers

Jesuit Volunteer Corps

But while the national picture appeared brighter, applications for the Jesuit Volunteer Corps (JVC) in Oregon and Washington State dropped by a third, and the JVC had to close five houses. The Marianist volunteers in the Midwest had to shut down their operations in that region completely. The problem, program directors say, is a tight volunteer market. The rapid expansion of volunteer programs is creating a demand for volunteers exceeding their numbers.

In order to take in more recruits, programs are looking to new volunteer markets. Although slightly more than half of the 484 Jesuit Volunteers are Jesuit college alumnae, the JVC in the Pacific Northwest, for example, has been offering a volunteer year for retired people. Said Jesuit Father Gary Smith, a Portland, Oregon street minister, "The idea of bringing together people of that age and bringing their experience to the work setting seems to be working well."

An airline has also found a way to tap into volunteerism by offering miles for volunteer work. According to the Student Travel Newsletter, United Airlines has developed a "United College Plus Volunteer Miles" program aimed at college students. For every 50 hours of volunteer work given to at least one of seven different nonprofit organizations, students earn 5,000 bonus miles up to a maximum of 10,000 total miles during a 12-month school year. That means students could help pay for their spring break airfare to the Caribbean by ladling out meals to hungry people closer to home.—Joel Schorn

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The taxman cometh
It's that dreadful time of year again fellow taxpayers. It's too late to do anything about 1999, but the federal budget for 2001 is currently under discussion in Congress.

Ever wonder where the money the federal government uses comes from and where it goes?

Most federal revenues come from taxes. Between 1956 and 1999, payroll taxes increased substantially as a percent of total revenues, and corporate income taxes declined, but individual income taxes have remained roughly constant. Lately revenues have been greater than spending (when monies from the social security "trust fund," where the current surplus actually resides, are included), and the government has been able to reduce the national debt with the difference between revenues and spending, that is, the surplus.

Revenues come from these sources:

Individual income taxes will raise an estimated $972 billion in 2001, equal to about 9.7 percent of GDP.

Social insurance payroll taxes include Social Security taxes, Medicare taxes, unemployment insurance taxes, and Federal employee retirement payments. This category has grown from two percent of GDP in 1955 to an estimated 6.8 percent in 2001.

Corporate income taxes, which will raise an estimated $195 billion, have shrunk steadily as a percent of GDP, from 4.5 percent in 1955 to an estimated 1.9 percent in 2001.

Excise taxes apply to various products, including alcohol, tobacco, transportation fuels, and telephone services. The Government earmarks some of these taxes to support certain activities—including highways and airports and airways—and deposits others in the general fund.

The Government also collects estate and gift taxes, customs duties, and miscellaneous revenues, e.g., Federal Reserve earnings, fines, penalties, and forfeitures.

The Federal Government will spend over $1.8 trillion and have a surplus of $184 billion in 2001.

Its first spending duty is to its creditors: $208 billion will be used on interest payments on the national debt, primarily the result of previous budget deficits. Interest payments on the national debt averaged seven percent of federal spending in the 1960s and 1970s. But, due to the large budget deficits that began in the 1980s that share quickly doubled to 15 percent by 1989. Since the budget is now in surplus, interest payments are estimated to drop to 11 percent of the budget in 2001.

A good chunk of the federal budget is devoted to "mandatory spending," such as Social Security and Medicare.

Social Security, which will provide monthly benefits to over 45 million retired and disabled workers, their dependents, and survivors, accounts for 23 percent of all federal spending.

Medicare, which will provide health care coverage for over 40 million elderly Americans and people with disabilities, accounts for seven percent of the budget.

Other mandatory spending includes means-tested benefits to people and families with incomes below certain minimum levels that vary from program to program.

The major means-tested entitlements are Food Stamps and food aid to Puerto Rico, Supplemental Security Income, Child Nutrition, the Earned Income Tax Credit, and veterans pensions. This category will account for an estimated six percent of the budget. The remaining mandatory spending, which mainly consists of federal retirement and insurance programs, unemployment insurance, and payments to farmers, comprises six percent of the budget.

Current national defense discretionary spending will total an estimated $292 billion in 2001, comprising 16 percent of the budget but nearly half of all discretionary spending. (Many argue that when spending for the Veteran's Administration, other miscellaneous military and veteran support costs, and "past spending"—the military's contribution to interest payment on the debt—is factored in, the percentage of "actual" military spending far exceeds the 16 percent noted officially by the federal government.)

Under current Clinton administration proposals, nine percent of your Federal dollar (the budget surplus) in 2001 will not be spent but used to reduce the Federal debt to assure the continued solvency of Social Security and Medicare.

That leaves $355 billion for everything else the federal government wants, hopes, dreams, or just plain has to do to improve the lives, liberties, and pursuits of happiness for U.S. and global citizens. Non-defense discretionary spending—a wide array of programs that include education, training, science, technology, housing, transportation, and foreign aid—has shrunk as a share of the budget from 23 percent in 1966 to less than 19 percent in 2001.

Budget purists prefer not to count Social Security as part of the federal budget since it is technically an employer and worker maintained "trust fund." That status has not prevented the federal government from borrowing heavily from Social Security to meet past budget shortfalls, nor to use its current surplus to project a total federal budget "surplus" that would actually add up to another deficit without the inclusion of the Social Security surplus in the overall 2001 budget.

Adding up 2001 federal revenues and expenditures without Social Security means an income of $1.337 trillion versus expenditures totalling $1.413 trillion—in other words a budget shortfall of $76 billion, no matter how often the word surplus gets mentioned around Washington these days.—Kevin Clarke

Here's the breakdown in revenue for 2001 in billions:		Here's the breakdown in spending for 2001 in billions:
Individual	$972	Defense discretionary	$279
Corporate	195	Non-defense discretionary	355
Social Security	682	Social Security	422
Excise tax	77	Medicare/caid	314
Estate and gift	32	Means-tested entitlements	111
Custom duties	21	Other entitlements	117
Misc	40	Net interest on debt	208

Total revenue	$2,019	Total expenditures	$1,835

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